CFD in the Small Design Office

The December/January 2022 issue (#194) of Professional Boatbuilder magazine has an excellent article written by Canadian designer Steve Killing on the use and practicality of CFD software in the small design office. You can download the article here (PDF), and if you haven’t already I suggest that you subscribe to Professional Boatbuilder (electronic subscriptions are free for industry professionals). It’s a fantastic resource for technical information on the boatbuilding industry, with consistently relevant and practical content.

Steve writes:

I admit that 20 years ago I was a skeptic. I had yet to see computer predictions that were solidly borne out on the water, and a combination of the cumbersome interface and the cost put it out of reach for me as an independent designer. Yet today I am running high-powered CFD in my one-man office—and loving it. What changed?

If you had asked me even five years ago whether I thought I would be running CFD in my office, the answer would have been a definite no. I didn’t have the knowledge, the cash, or the computer power to make it viable. But a lot has happened in a short time to make CFD practical for the small design office. Of course, the same is true for large offices—the software I rely on is also used by major recreational boatbuilders, shipyards, the USCG, and university naval architecture programs.

Read the full article to find out why Steve has found running CFD in-house to be an important and cost-effective tool in his design work.

Steve uses Orca3D Marine CFD and while his focus is on small craft, the software is equally valid for any type of vessel, be it large or small, fast or slow, planing or displacement, mono- or multi-hull. To learn more about Orca3D Marine CFD and try the software yourself, contact us or schedule an on-line custom demonstration. After the demonstration/tutorial, we will provide you with an evaluation license so that you can see how easy it is to use the software, and benchmark the results against your own data.